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Please raise your hand if you’ve ever bounced a check or overdrawn your bank account. If you’re not raising your hand (or nodding) then I know you’re lying. I, at a very early point in my single life, foolishly and mistakenly believed that a bank wouldn’t deposit a check until the date I filled in.

The reasoning went something like this: “Oh, I don’t get paid for another two weeks? I’ll just “post date” the check for the day after I get paid. Here you go, sir. Here’s my “hot” check.”

The bank eventually closed my checking account. At that point, I used my savings account for personal banking for over a year to regain my lost trust. Painful, painful. Luckily, I wised up before I got listed in the ChexSystems database. What’s the ChexSystems database? According to DR at DoughRoller:

“If an account holder overdraws his or her account multiple times, “bounces” checks, commits identity theft or fraud, or stops using an overdrawn account without having covered the negative balance, the account is considered delinquent, and a file on the consumer is opened with ChexSystems. This implies that the customer will be banned from opening a checking account at any bank that is a member of ChexSystems for approximately 5 years.”

Ouch. So, what to do if you’ve been thrown into ChexSystems? Apparently, there are 3rd party, independent companies that will help you find a checking account from “Second Chance Checking” banks.

The idea behind a second chance checking account is that it provides a consumer who has no other alternative, a second chance at a bank account.

What about you? Have you had experience with the ChexSystems? Have you been able to get a “Second Chance” account setup elsewhere?